Being traveller with a place to go back to is a contribution that I live by. To live a life where you feel don’t belong so you travel. It becomes hard when you have ties in a place. I know, as my family has lived in the same town since I was born. Yeah we might of moved a block, a mile or two, but it is not the same as some of my friends that lived in one state one year anther the next. However I do travel some and here are some of the stories of, as a saying goes, grass doesn’t grow under your feet.
Before I begin, I want to share what grass doesn’t grow under your feet means and how I heard of the saying. Now what it means is that one does not wait for someone to tell them what to do or something to happen. It was used on me the first time that I had heard of it about a week or so ago, before I was heading to Iowa City to do some strongman training (that might be an article for another day). It was said to me by John Skipper, a newspaper writer brought out some of my curiosity in writing, while we were having lunch after church.
Living in one town all your life has its ups and downs. Always knowing where your house is, the area is familiar to you since you have always lived and you know people in the area. The downside is you don’t see much of the world outside of that area. So you don’t meet new people, see new things and never have the experiences of different life.
Growing up, my family would go on these trips with the family, starting my desire to never let my roots grow in a spot for too long. However, the person that I credit the most for it, and I thank for this, is a good friend of mine Audrey Sparks. She has lived an amazing life that has been full of adventure and awe. Being around her and going on mini adventures with her had made me realize that you get one chance at life so you need to spend your time living and experiencing it. She also taught me it is also okay to have a place to go back to. However at this point in my life I will not completely agree with it.
One trip that stands out to me is going to Portland, Oregon when I was visiting Sparks. It was a bit of an improve to trip that I took. We had talked about me visiting her and about half way through the summer, I had texted when would work for her and she had said that the next weekend would be good. So over the next few days I looked at ticket prices and then I got my ticket (at a price that will be unsaid). I told her my flight schedule and then we had a plan of attack. I flew out on a Friday night and then Monday night I had left there. When I saw her at the airport, I gave her a big old bear hug.
The time spent there was having fun and laughing. We had gone to see Shakespeare in a graveyard, an arcade and a farmers market. I had met her niece Cati who was a fun person to be around. When I was seeing Portland, I got to see a city that for the first time, outside of the road, a place that was a home for me. The people of the city have the motto and it is, “Stay Strange Portland.” It is fun and of what I’ve seen the people are open and fun. The culture is fun, accepting and completely different from Iowa. This is just part of what I have to say about Portland.
The flight back to Iowa was a red eye, overnight flight, in which I didn’t land in Des Moines until about 8 a.m. with a two hour drive still to go. I have a brother in the Des Moines area and he wanted me stop at his house to water his plants before I leave. So I get back to my hometown about noon to rest for a bit, and the next morning I was heading towards an area near Canada.
In the past week of me writing this, I was in West Branch, Iowa. The thing I was doing there was weightlifting, strongman training and visiting my cousin. Now West Branch is near the Iowa City-Des Moines area. My cousin is a strength trainer that works with the high schoolers and middle schoolers. He helps train the kids in sports, the kids in weightlifting and some strongman. When I was there I was helping him do this, help watch his four year old twins and doing some of my own training. The people that I had meet when I was there are a group of people that I had not interacted with, in that environment. A level of deduction that I didn’t think that came with sports. The level was based on some of the people that I considered the sportspeople.
Now the funny thing about me writing this is the fact that I am sitting at a coffee shop right now about to hit the road again. That is how life works at times for people. So until the next coffee shop or cheap motel that has wifi, live life and have fun.
